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Some recipes are just so easy, so satisfying and so cheap that I could make them every week. This crockpot chicken stew is one of those.

In fact, I just made this for the first time yesterday, and the whole family was so thrilled with it that I just had to write up this post immediately. The chicken, the veges, the potatoes – this is one complete meal as-is. But, you might want some rolls to “clean” your bowl with. The gravy-type sauce of this stew is AH-MAZE-ING.

Did I mention how easy it is? Or how this is the perfect freezer meal? If you don't want to make it now, you could just throw it all in a freezer bag raw (except for the butter, milk and flour) and freeze for several months.

Here are the ingredients. Note that I used about 1 1/2 chicken breasts in this and cut them into chunks. Also, this shows 2 celery stalks, but I only used 1.

Chop up the vegetables and put them in the crockpot.

Top with the chicken, spices and the water. Put the lid on and cook it for several hours (low for 8 hours, medium for 6 hours, and high for 4 hours).

After it's done cooking and you are almost ready to serve, it's time to add our thickener to give it that smooth, creamy, gravy-type sauce that kicks this dish up several notches. There are 2 ways to do this:

Cornstarch in water or milk

Roux

I usually always prefer a roux. It's smoother and has a deeper flavor. It only takes 5 minutes and is super easy. Start by melting 2 Tbsp of butter in a small sauce pan over medium heat. Once it melts, add 2 Tbsp of all purpose flour. We make our dishes gluten-free in this house, so we simply used a gluten-free baking flour.

[To us cornstarch, whisk 1/2 cup of milk in a bowl with 2 Tbsp is cornstarch. Once blended, add to the crockpot and mix. Cover and let it cook for another 20 minutes.]

Get your whisk out and stir it constantly for a few minutes over medium heat. After about 5 minutes, it will change to a brown color. You can cook it for longer if you want and it will get darker, but you don't need to.

Then add the milk and whisk it for just another minute until it is blended well and is thick and bubbly.